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Key Chemicals Month
This month we feature chemicals that have important applications in industry and the lab.—Ed.

Acrylonitrile (aka propenenitrile, vinyl cyanide) is a useful organic monomer and reactant that must be handled very carefully. As the hazard information table shows, it is toxic in multiple ways. Last year, the National Cancer Institute (Bethesda, MD) reported that, in a 25,000-person study, workers who made or used acrylonitrile in locations that exceeded the regulatory exposure limits had than those who were protected by the regulations.

The was first reported in 1893 by prominent French pharmacist/chemist Charles Moureu in a treatise on acrylic acid and its derivatives. Moureu using a method developed by Jean Baptiste Dumas �60 years earlier. In 1920, Moureu, along with Ralph I. Brown, made acrylonitrile from 3-hydroxypropionitrile using the same method.

Acrylonitrile did not become an important chemical until the 1940s, when it was first used to make polymers; but an economical production method was not available until the early 1960s, when the â€�Sohio processâ€�, developed by the Standard Oil Company of Ohio, came online. The process consists of feeding propylene, ammonia, and air over a bismuth phosphomolybdate (Bi₉PMo₁₂O₅₂) ammoxidation catalyst. The yield of acrylonitrile is â‰�50%; the main byproducts are acetonitrile and hydrogen cyanide. The current global market for acrylonitrile is â‰�7 million tonnes.

Acrylonitrile is primarily used in the manufacture of homopolymers (polyacrylonitriles) and copolymers with olefins such as butadiene, styrene, and acrylic acid. Products made from the polymers include synthetic rubbers and fibers for workwear, hoses, membranes, and precursors to carbon fibers. Nitrile gloves are acrylonitrile–butadiene copolymers. Other uses include the synthesis of chemicals such as propionitrile, acrylamide, methyl acrylate, and more complex molecules via a reaction called cyanoethylation.

In June 2024, Trillium Renewable Chemicals (Knoxville, TN), a 2023 startup, announced the scaleup of its at an Ineos Nitriles plant in Port Lavaca, TX. The synthesis begins with glycerol, a byproduct of soap and detergent manufacture from natural polyglycerides; it is converted to acrolein via catalytic hydrolysis and then to acrylonitrile using the Sohio process.